Homicide Related: A Ryan Dooley Mystery
EPub edition copyright © August 2011
Copyright © 2009 Norah McClintock
5 4 3 2 1
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A Fitzhenry & Whiteside Company
195 Allstate Parkway,
Markham, ON L3R 4T8
www.reddeerpress.com
Edited for the Press by Peter Carver
Cover design by Jacquie Morris and Delta Embree,
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Text design by Tanya Montini
Acknowledgments
We acknowledge with thanks the Canada Council for the Arts, and the Ontario Arts Council for their support of our publishing program. We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund (CBF) for our publishing activities.
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
McClintock, Norah
Homicide related / Norah McClintock.
(A Ryan Dooley mystery) ISBN 978-0-88995-431-1
eISBN 978-1-55244-297-5
I. Title. II. Series: McClintock, Norah . Ryan Dooley mystery.
PS8575.C62H64 2009 jC813'.54 C2008-908114-5
United States Cataloging-in-Publication Data
McClintock, Norah.
Homicide related : a Ryan Dooley mystery / Norah McClintock.
Summary: Ryan Dooley continues to struggle against circumstances that would defeat most teenagers. Somehow, though, Dooley is able to work his way through the immense hazards in his life and emerge, not unscathed, but with his integrity intact.
ISBN: 978-0-8899-5431-1 (pbk.)
eISBN: 978-1-55244-297-5
1. Mystery and detective stories. I. Title.
[Fic] dc22 PZ7.M33Hom 2009
Acknowledgments
To the girls,
more precious than they know.
One
It was Monday, another soul-sucking, numbness-inducing day exactly like every other day, except for a single moment that ambushed Dooley like a pop quiz. Dooley didn’t like pop quizzes. He didn’t like surprises. This particular moment was like a pop quiz in his favorite subject, the kind of quiz where you think, hey, no problem. All you have to do is circle the right answer: A, B, C, or D. You whiz through it so fast and with so much confidence that you’re out of there before anyone else, convinced you aced it, until sometime in the space between when you downed your pencil and when you have that class again, it hits you: They were trick questions.
The day started like this:
He got up at seven after going to bed a mere six hours earlier because Kevin, the shit manager—shift manager—at the video store where he worked insisted that everyone—and that includes you, Dooley—close at least one weeknight every week. Closing meant nudging all the lingering customers out the door as soon as possible after midnight (Dooley still hadn’t figured out just how bored or desperate or just plain disorganized a person had to be to show up at a video store at five minutes to twelve in the first place) and then straightening the shelves and mopping the floors while the shift manager—usually, unfortunately, Kevin—counted the cash and prepped the bank deposit, which, in turn, meant not getting out of the store until twelve-thirty at the earliest—most nights it was more like a quarter to one—and that meant not getting home until sometime after one and having to unwind without being able to indulge in any of the fun unwinding activities that he used to enjoy. Big whoop.
After dragging himself out of bed, he went downstairs for breakfast. On a Monday morning, it was usually just Dooley and his uncle in the kitchen, unless Jeannie, his uncle’s friend—which is how Dooley’s uncle had introduced her to Dooley: friend, not girlfriend—had stayed over. If she had, then either Dooley had the kitchen to himself because his uncle was still upstairs with Jeannie, or he’d find her in the kitchen reading the business section of the newspaper (she owned and managed two ladies’ wear stores), her perfume mixing with the smell of coffee, while Dooley’s uncle tackled the local news, which consisted almost exclusively of crime stories (he was a retired cop). This morning, it had been just Dooley and his uncle, and his uncle had been in the same crappy mood he’d been in for the past couple of days. Dooley kept waiting for him to explain what he was so pissed off about, but so far he’d kept that to himself while he carped about everything and anything. Like: “When the hell are you going to return those library books? I thought you finished that assignment.”
Which was true. Dooley had finished it. And what a fun exercise it had been—one thousand riveting words about the causes of one of the dullest wars in history, the first big one.
“I’ll get to it,” Dooley said.
“When?” His uncle snapped the word at him. The guy should have been a reporter—his favorite words were who, what, when, where, and why (as in, Why the hell did you [fill in the blank with some dumb-ass thing Dooley had allegedly done]?).
“When I get a chance,” Dooley said.
“I saw the slip. They’re due tomorrow.”
“So I’ll take them back tomorrow.”
“Why don’t you take them back today? You’re done with them, aren’t you?”
“I said I’d take care of it,” Dooley said.
“You should have taken care of it yesterday. That’s when you handed in your assignment, correct?”
Jesus, it was like he was living with a cantankerous, semi-senile old granny instead of a supposedly on-the-ball uncle.
“I was working yesterday,” Dooley said. In fact, he’d done a double shift, taking one from Linelle because she’d asked him and because he owed her—which his uncle knew because he was worse than a probation officer the way he kept tabs on Dooley.
“Always with the excuses,” his uncle muttered.
Dooley looked across the table at him. His uncle was forty-nine years old, retired four years. He was a little shorter than Dooley and had more weight on him, but all of it was one hundred percent muscle. He wasn’t a cop anymore. He was a small-businessman, but that didn’t mean he’d let himself go. No, he ate right (except on poker night), worked out regularly—weights and cardio—and didn’t take shit from anyone, ever. He could be one scary dude. He could also, like now, be a major pain in the ass. Dooley could have explained to his uncle—again—that he wasn’t making excuses. He could have said, what’s the problem; the books aren’t even due yet. He could have told him, even if they were due, the fine is only thirty cents a day, and he could handle that easily; he had a job; that’s where he had been for six-and-a-half hours yesterday. He could have said, back the fuck off. But that wouldn’t have ended it. On the contrary, it would have been like trying to put out a smoldering fire with a can of kerosene. Besides, this wasn’t about a couple of library books. It wasn’t even about Dooley. It was about something that, so far, his uncle di
dn’t want to talk about. As Dooley’s therapist would have put it, it wasn’t Dooley’s monkey. So Dooley got up, rinsed his cereal bowl and put it into the dishwasher, and moved on to the next thrill of the day, which was:
School.
He hated school. He always had, even back when it consisted of finger painting and counting. He couldn’t figure out what use he would ever have for geometry or trigonometry or even, let’s be honest, French. He liked to read—when he was locked up that time, his uncle had brought him a book every time he came to visit, and Dooley had read them all. But he hated the reading they were assigned in school, always stuff they were supposed to learn a lesson from, the teacher always asking what the theme was, like that’s what people’s lives were about, instead of chance and mischance and good intentions gone all to hell. He only stuck with school because it was a condition they’d put on him when he was released, along with holding down a job, staying away from drugs, alcohol, weapons, and baseball bats, and attending regular counseling—all of which he did, finding, to his surprise, that going to school was the hardest to comply with. The school administration hadn’t been exactly delighted when his uncle had enrolled him. Mr. Rektor, the A-to-L vice-principal, did everything he could to encourage Dooley to pack it in. He probably would have liked nothing better than to see Dooley in trouble again. His teachers all knew about his past, even though they probably shouldn’t. One of them, a new female teacher who lived in the suburbs, had yet to make eye contact with him; a couple of times when he’d gone up to her desk to turn in an assignment, she had visibly cringed, as if she were afraid he was going to attack her. His history teacher was openly hostile to him. Dooley had lost count of the number of times the guy had been writing on the chalkboard, his back to the class, and someone had acted up, maybe stage-whispered some remark that made everyone laugh, and who did the teacher’s eyes go to when he whirled around to locate the troublemaker? Yup. Dooley. The only class he even remotely liked was phys. ed., and that was mostly because he could work off some of what he was feeling. The gym teacher was a tough old guy who looked like he might have been a drill sergeant. He yelled at all the guys, not just Dooley. It was like being back inside.
Worse than school was homework, and he was looking at a gigantic heap of it when he stepped outside again at three-twenty that afternoon. At least, that’s what he was looking at, at first. And then there it was—that pop-quiz moment. It wasn’t even multiple choice. It came down to A or B—pay attention to this or pay attention to that. It seemed dead easy.
He had just left school through one of the side doors when he saw a car pull up half a block away—a midnight blue Jag convertible with the top down, because it was an astonishingly warm day for early November and the sun was brilliant in the clear blue sky overhead. Dooley stopped short on the school steps, surprising the kid behind him, who rammed into him and swore at him: Why the fuck didn’t he watch where he was going? Dooley turned and, okay, there was no point in denying it, he got a kick out of way the snarl and bluster died on the kid’s face when he saw who he’d rammed into. He got even more of a kick out of the kid’s muttered apology. He turned from the kid to stare again at the Jag. Even at this distance he could see that the guy behind the wheel had more going for him than just the vehicle he was driving. He also had a haircut that looked like it was windproof. He’d probably paid a bundle for it so that it would lie down where it was supposed to, when it was supposed to, no matter what. His teeth were so white that they gleamed like a porcelain gash across the middle of his face when he flashed a smile at his passenger. The fact that he was driving a Jag meant that he was probably loaded—or, more likely, Daddy and Mommy were. Also—and this was where Dooley’s stomach did a backward double-gainer—he had the prettiest girl Dooley had ever seen sitting right up there beside him.
Beth.
Her head was turned to the driver, but Dooley would have recognized her even if she’d had her back to him and she was a full block away. He continued down the steps and onto the sidewalk. The driver of the car was saying something, and Beth was laughing. Dooley stepped back a pace so that he was out of sight while he tried to figure out what it all meant. What was Beth doing with that guy? Who the hell was he? What were they doing here?
Then, behind him, someone—a woman—said, “Excuse me” in a soft voice.
Dooley tore his eyes away from Beth and the guy with the porcelain mouth and turned toward the sound of the voice.
And there it was—suddenly he had two females claiming his attention, and all he had to do was pick one and let the other one go.
It was a no-brainer. He turned back to see what Beth was doing. He was aware of the soft voice behind him, but the blood was pounding so loudly in his ears that he couldn’t make out the words. He could barely feel his feet on the sidewalk, either. He was looking at the Jag but, from where he was standing now, all he could see was the front bumper and the hood. Beth hadn’t appeared yet. She must still be in the car with that guy. What was she doing?
He started toward the car, but found himself tugged backward and felt something—a slip of paper—being pressed into his hand. He glanced over his shoulder, annoyed. The voice speeded up, the words coming at him in a breathless rush, like the woman who was talking was afraid he was going to walk away before she finished whatever it was she had to say.
He heard a car door slam.
Beth stepped into sight down the block. Dooley caught his breath as he waited to read the expression on her face. She smiled. She seemed glad to see him. And, boy, he was always glad to see her. She had lively brown eyes, and hair the same color, only glossy. She had creamy white skin and full pink lips, and she was nice and slim.
He crumpled the slip of paper, let it fall to the ground, and started to walk away. Something closed on his arm again, and again he felt himself being hooked backward. The crumpled paper was pressed into his hand again. Jesus, what was the matter with her; why didn’t she leave him alone? He jerked his hand away and strode toward Beth, jamming the piece of paper into his pocket this time, thinking he would toss it later. His heart pounded. His eyes and thoughts were on Beth and only her. He wanted to throw his arms open and see if she would walk into them, but at the last minute he was afraid to, because what if she didn’t? She came straight to him and slipped her arms around his waist. He inhaled the familiar scent of her hair, her skin, the soap she used, the shampoo, and then, he couldn’t have stopped himself even if he’d wanted to, he kissed her and slid his arms around her and marveled, not for the first time, at how soft she was and how firm, too, underneath the long sweater she was wearing.
“Surprised to see me?” she said.
“Yeah,” Dooley said, and that was the truth. “You skipping school?” Beth went to a private school, girls only. She actually seemed to like it. She took school seriously, too. But her classes ended twenty-five minutes later than his, so there was no way she could be all the way down here so early, even if someone—Mr. Midnight Blue Jag—had given her a lift.
“There was a faculty meeting,” she said. “They let us out early, so I decided to surprise you.” She glanced around him. “Who were you were talking to?”
Dooley turned and saw that the woman was standing exactly where he had left her. He gave her a sharp look. Her eyes met his and a little smile played across her lips. She nodded almost imperceptibly before turning and walking away.
“Just some woman,” Dooley said.
“What did she want?”
“She was lost. She wanted directions,” Dooley said. He glanced at her again. She was a block away now, looking small and getting smaller with every step she took. “Who’s the guy in the Jag?”
Beth’s cheeks turned pink, like she’d been caught out.
“That’s Nevin,” she said.
“Nevin?” Who the hell was Nevin? Dooley had never heard the name before. And what kind of name was Nevin anyway? “Who’s he?”
“A guy I know. From school.”
; “From school? I thought your school was girls only.”
“I don’t mean he goes to my school,” Beth said. “He’s on the debating team at his school.” Beth was on her school’s debating team. Dooley didn’t understand why. He didn’t understand why anyone would want to be on a debating team. But Beth said it gave her experience in public speaking and in thinking on her feet. She said they were important life skills, and it would be good for her to know how to do both things. “We debate all kinds of schools, Dooley, not just other girls’ schools. We debate boys’ schools, co-ed private schools, even public schools.”
“So, what, you know him pretty well?” Dooley said.
“I guess. His parents are friends of my parents—well, of my mom’s.” So she didn’t know him just from school. “You should see him in action.” Dooley bet he was really something, especially with that Jag. “He’s amazing. He wins almost every debate he enters. We get together sometimes and take each other on.”
“Take each other on?”
“We put a bunch of be-it-resolveds into a hat—you know, be it resolved that history is the academic branch of propaganda, or be it resolved that citizens should be required by law to vote—and then we debate them raw.”
“Raw?” He didn’t like the sound of that.
“That’s what Nevin calls it. It means without any preparation. I’ve learned a lot from him.”
He wondered why she’d never mentioned that before.
She’d never mentioned Nevin, either.
“This getting together and taking each other on,” he said.
“When does that happen?”
She shrugged. “Just whenever.”
“Do you do it at school?”
“Sometimes. Sometimes we do it at his place. Or my place.”
“Your place?”
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